‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’: The movie that damaged Jesse Eisenberg’s career
With his rapid speech and slightly goofy persona, Jesse Eisenberg has curated a filmography of quirky and unconventional characters, famously playing Mark Zuckerberg in David Fincher’s The Social Network, as well as recently starring in Fleishman Is In Trouble and returning to the director’s chair for A Real Pain, which he also stars in alongside Kieran Culkin. With an eclectic taste in film and an extremely articulate way of speaking about his interests, the filmmaker constantly displays a level of introspection and self-awareness about his work, always looking back on his projects with a critical eye.
However, this can also be a double-edged sword, with the actor recently discussing his painful memories of starring in Zack Snyder’s 2016 movie Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
Batman is about as infamous as any superhero can get, with many great actors reprising the character over the years, such as Ben Affleck, Robert Pattinson and Michael Keaton. However, Zack Snyder was the first to devise the bizarre idea of meshing two superhero stories together, posing the genius question of what would happen if Batman and Superman were to fight against each other.
The result is a fairly messy and disastrous film that was not met kindly by audiences, with people criticising Snyder for his ability to make such a battle so incredibly boring and pointless.
Much to Eisenberg’s dismay, he starred in the movie as Lex Luthor, a villain who was formerly an American President and then became an enemy of Batman. However, the actor does not remember this role fondly, saying, “I was in this ‘Batman’ movie and the ‘Batman’ movie was so poorly received, and I was so poorly received”.
He added: “I’ve never said this before and it’s kind of embarrassing to admit, but I genuinely think it actually hurt my career in a real way, because I was poorly received in something so public. I’ve been in poorly received things that just don’t see the light of day, and for the most part, no one knows, but this was so public, and I don’t read notices or reviews or movie press or anything, so I was unaware of how poorly it was received.”
Eisenberg is somewhat of an indie darling, starring in projects such as The Double, The Squid and the Whale and Sasquatch Sunset, demonstrating his taste through the projects he aligns himself with and opting to work with filmmakers that don’t operate on the studio level. This offers a vague kind of protection to actors, with these films rarely making it to mainstream cinema and being less seen by the wider public, meaning you are less vulnerable to public scrutiny.
However, the experience of starring in the DC universe as one of the original villains opened up his fanbase to a whole new level, which he believes had a negative impact on his career after being met so poorly. While it is imaginably very disappointing when something you’ve worked on doesn’t do well and leaves you open to harsh words, Eisenberg has definitely been able to bounce back, and his recent film A Real Pain shows a new side to his writing as he explores the relationship between family history, collective trauma and modern suffering.
